Ginko12 Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 Ugh, I feel so ashamed of myself. I'm coming out of a very conservative form of Christianity (Orthodoxy). There used to be a lot of talk about how the culture war issues just don't plague this church; there's no arguments about women's roles, homosexuality, etc. I think that was only because for awhile the church was mostly filled with immigrants, because the more Americans convert, and the more the children and grandchildren of immigrants Americanize, the more these questions start to show up. There was an argument going on the past week or two about a parish being welcoming to gays and lesbians. My husband first told me about it. Then yesterday I got an email "my" parish priest wanted forwarded to everyone in the parish. It was a link to this incredibly judgmental, unkindly worded statement by a bunch of clergy about how terrible homosexuality is, and how intolerable it is to wonder if maybe there's nothing wrong with homosexuality. To me it read, "If you don't hate gay people, get out of this religion." I was incensed. I have always tried to keep out of the political fights in my church because they just piss me off. Hard to stay out of it when it shows up in everybody's inbox. I think, "Well, I already had one foot out the door, now they're pushing the rest of me out. So I guess this parting ways is mutual." I let my anger and frustration get the best of me and I posted something to that effect on Facebook. One guy from my old parish, who is nice and I like him a lot, responded. At one point he said something about how without Christ, he couldn't make himself better. That just touched me off even more, and I started saying how Christ was never there for me, in all the moments that I screamed out for him to help me, please! Nothing. So of course practically every Christian I know sees this and thinks I'm going down the tubes, and my life is horrible because God won't respond to me, and blah blah blah, even though I'm describing a way I felt 2-3 years ago. It's like an intervention on my FB page. And I'm trying to explain, look, I'm not in this much pain now, I'm actually happy now, and I'm not angry at God anymore, I just don't feel like there's anybody there. And by the way, everything else about my life is awesome now, here's a list. But everyone just keeps focusing on me feeling tortured by God giving me the silent treatment. And how about those friends and family I mentioned that helped me out? Didn't God put them in my path? Well, I suppose it's possible, but I see no compelling reason to believe that. Anyway, I woke up this morning embarrassed about the whole thing. This was not how I wanted to handle it and I let myself get irritated into doing something stupid. I know the feeling will pass and people who really care about me will forgive me. But in the meantime I have some fences to mend. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♦ ficino ♦ Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 Hi Ginko, at least now it's out in the open. As you say, the people who really care about you will forgive you. I'm not sure what you need to be forgiven for unless you posted unnecessarily unkind things. Anyway, it's a cliche by now, but "Conceal, don't feel, don't let them know. Well, now they know. Let it go..." 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thackerie Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 It seems to me that it's the people who objected to your honest expression who should be working on mending fences, but I guess that's too much to ask for since judgmental evangelicals will never admit to being wrong. I don't do Facebook. (I communicate with my REAL friends by phone and email just fine.) So, my advice in this regard may be off, and I hope that some exC members who can help you more show up soon. (I do recall reading forums here about people being accidentally outed on Facebook.) But, what I would do in this situation is either (1) respond to all those irritating posts with something very short like "Thank you for your concern. It is no longer up for discussion" and repeat, repeat, repeat until they give up or (2) stay off Facebook. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ginko12 Posted November 15, 2014 Author Share Posted November 15, 2014 Well I'm not worried about the "intervention" stuff that was focused on getting me to keep believing. However, I had been planning on talking to some people face to face or on the phone, and various random things kept screwing up that plan for the last couple weeks. I feel bad that I broke the "news" to them on Facebook. It was irresponsible and disrespectful of me. I actually hate Facebook with a burning passion, but among the people I know, if it didn't happen on Facebook, it didn't happen. I've tried to leave that horrible place twice, but I was completely out of the loop. I've accepted it as a necessary evil, and normally I don't even post there much, I don't know what came over me yesterday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Llwellyn Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 Anyway, I woke up this morning embarrassed about the whole thing. This was not how I wanted to handle it and I let myself get irritated into doing something stupid. I know the feeling will pass and people who really care about me will forgive me. But in the meantime I have some fences to mend. Don't be embarrassed about expressing your thoughts and feelings -- you didn't do it to attack anyone or hurt anyone. You have nothing to be forgiven for. You don't have "fences to mend" -- if the relationships were disrupted, it was due to no fault of your own, it's just a feature of the religion. Do not suppose that Christianity brings peace to the earth. It does not exist to bring peace, but a sword. It exists to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her motherinlaw. Christianity would have it that a woman's enemies would be the members of her own household. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 Ugh, I feel so ashamed of myself. I'm coming out of a very conservative form of Christianity (Orthodoxy). There used to be a lot of talk about how the culture war issues just don't plague this church; there's no arguments about women's roles, homosexuality, etc. I think that was only because for awhile the church was mostly filled with immigrants, because the more Americans convert, and the more the children and grandchildren of immigrants Americanize, the more these questions start to show up. There was an argument going on the past week or two about a parish being welcoming to gays and lesbians. My husband first told me about it. Then yesterday I got an email "my" parish priest wanted forwarded to everyone in the parish. It was a link to this incredibly judgmental, unkindly worded statement by a bunch of clergy about how terrible homosexuality is, and how intolerable it is to wonder if maybe there's nothing wrong with homosexuality. To me it read, "If you don't hate gay people, get out of this religion." I was incensed. I have always tried to keep out of the political fights in my church because they just piss me off. Hard to stay out of it when it shows up in everybody's inbox. I think, "Well, I already had one foot out the door, now they're pushing the rest of me out. So I guess this parting ways is mutual." I let my anger and frustration get the best of me and I posted something to that effect on Facebook. One guy from my old parish, who is nice and I like him a lot, responded. At one point he said something about how without Christ, he couldn't make himself better. That just touched me off even more, and I started saying how Christ was never there for me, in all the moments that I screamed out for him to help me, please! Nothing. So of course practically every Christian I know sees this and thinks I'm going down the tubes, and my life is horrible because God won't respond to me, and blah blah blah, even though I'm describing a way I felt 2-3 years ago. It's like an intervention on my FB page. And I'm trying to explain, look, I'm not in this much pain now, I'm actually happy now, and I'm not angry at God anymore, I just don't feel like there's anybody there. And by the way, everything else about my life is awesome now, here's a list. But everyone just keeps focusing on me feeling tortured by God giving me the silent treatment. And how about those friends and family I mentioned that helped me out? Didn't God put them in my path? Well, I suppose it's possible, but I see no compelling reason to believe that. Anyway, I woke up this morning embarrassed about the whole thing. This was not how I wanted to handle it and I let myself get irritated into doing something stupid. I know the feeling will pass and people who really care about me will forgive me. But in the meantime I have some fences to mend. You are merely saying out loud what some of these people also have felt, will feel or maybe are feeling right now. Don't feel ashamed. Shame is a Christian thing. Let those people feel ashamed if they like. It's not your problem. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 It seems to me that it's the people who objected to your honest expression who should be working on mending fences, but I guess that's too much to ask for since judgmental evangelicals will never admit to being wrong. I don't do Facebook. (I communicate with my REAL friends by phone and email just fine.) So, my advice in this regard may be off, and I hope that some exC members who can help you more show up soon. (I do recall reading forums here about people being accidentally outed on Facebook.) But, what I would do in this situation is either (1) respond to all those irritating posts with something very short like "Thank you for your concern. It is no longer up for discussion" and repeat, repeat, repeat until they give up or (2) stay off Facebook. A FB thread can be deleted easy enough. :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ginko12 Posted November 15, 2014 Author Share Posted November 15, 2014 It seems to me that it's the people who objected to your honest expression who should be working on mending fences, but I guess that's too much to ask for since judgmental evangelicals will never admit to being wrong. I don't do Facebook. (I communicate with my REAL friends by phone and email just fine.) So, my advice in this regard may be off, and I hope that some exC members who can help you more show up soon. (I do recall reading forums here about people being accidentally outed on Facebook.) But, what I would do in this situation is either (1) respond to all those irritating posts with something very short like "Thank you for your concern. It is no longer up for discussion" and repeat, repeat, repeat until they give up or (2) stay off Facebook. A FB thread can be deleted easy enough. :-) HAHA, yes it can. Already done this morning, though I'm sure within a week or two everyone I know will have heard about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ginko12 Posted November 15, 2014 Author Share Posted November 15, 2014 Anyway, I woke up this morning embarrassed about the whole thing. This was not how I wanted to handle it and I let myself get irritated into doing something stupid. I know the feeling will pass and people who really care about me will forgive me. But in the meantime I have some fences to mend. Don't be embarrassed about expressing your thoughts and feelings -- you didn't do it to attack anyone or hurt anyone. You have nothing to be forgiven for. You don't have "fences to mend" -- if the relationships were disrupted, it was due to no fault of your own, it's just a feature of the religion. Do not suppose that Christianity brings peace to the earth. It does not exist to bring peace, but a sword. It exists to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her motherinlaw. Christianity would have it that a woman's enemies would be the members of her own household. Very true, very true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 Well I'm not worried about the "intervention" stuff that was focused on getting me to keep believing. However, I had been planning on talking to some people face to face or on the phone, and various random things kept screwing up that plan for the last couple weeks. I feel bad that I broke the "news" to them on Facebook. It was irresponsible and disrespectful of me. I actually hate Facebook with a burning passion, but among the people I know, if it didn't happen on Facebook, it didn't happen. I've tried to leave that horrible place twice, but I was completely out of the loop. I've accepted it as a necessary evil, and normally I don't even post there much, I don't know what came over me yesterday. You are responsible to yourself. Let them be responsible for their own lives. Public gay hating under the supposed authority of the bible is disrespectful. Spamming emotionally charged socially polarizing emails is disrespectful. These people getting assed up over your response to unsolicited hate email is absurd. Maybe whoever sent this mass email out will think twice about doing it again. This is an era of change. Churches need to get over the gay thing. It's a losing battle. If the churchies have any smarts at all they should take your FB rant as a warning that the upcoming generations are not going to put up with institutionalized hate. They are losing attendees with their hate messages. Oh well, it is one of the growing pains of our evolving society. :-) 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 It seems to me that it's the people who objected to your honest expression who should be working on mending fences, but I guess that's too much to ask for since judgmental evangelicals will never admit to being wrong. I don't do Facebook. (I communicate with my REAL friends by phone and email just fine.) So, my advice in this regard may be off, and I hope that some exC members who can help you more show up soon. (I do recall reading forums here about people being accidentally outed on Facebook.) But, what I would do in this situation is either (1) respond to all those irritating posts with something very short like "Thank you for your concern. It is no longer up for discussion" and repeat, repeat, repeat until they give up or (2) stay off Facebook. A FB thread can be deleted easy enough. :-) HAHA, yes it can. Already done this morning, though I'm sure within a week or two everyone I know will have heard about it. There's a couple people who are Christians and like to forward Religious Right crap to my email... After blasting one of them back once or twice I just put them on auto-filter to the trash can. :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ginko12 Posted November 15, 2014 Author Share Posted November 15, 2014 It seems to me that it's the people who objected to your honest expression who should be working on mending fences, but I guess that's too much to ask for since judgmental evangelicals will never admit to being wrong. I don't do Facebook. (I communicate with my REAL friends by phone and email just fine.) So, my advice in this regard may be off, and I hope that some exC members who can help you more show up soon. (I do recall reading forums here about people being accidentally outed on Facebook.) But, what I would do in this situation is either (1) respond to all those irritating posts with something very short like "Thank you for your concern. It is no longer up for discussion" and repeat, repeat, repeat until they give up or (2) stay off Facebook. A FB thread can be deleted easy enough. :-) HAHA, yes it can. Already done this morning, though I'm sure within a week or two everyone I know will have heard about it. There's a couple people who are Christians and like to forward Religious Right crap to my email... After blasting one of them back once or twice I just put them on auto-filter to the trash can. :-) This was actually forwarded to everyone in the parish at the request of the priest. I can't say it's normal to get politically charged or controversial emails over the parish mailing list. Usually that is reserved for, "Remember we have a service for some holiday at such and such time, and don't forget to bring something to the potluck this Sunday." Not sure how much longer I'll be on that list either! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeThinkerNZ Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 Well I'm not worried about the "intervention" stuff that was focused on getting me to keep believing. However, I had been planning on talking to some people face to face or on the phone, and various random things kept screwing up that plan for the last couple weeks. I feel bad that I broke the "news" to them on Facebook. It was irresponsible and disrespectful of me. I actually hate Facebook with a burning passion, but among the people I know, if it didn't happen on Facebook, it didn't happen. I've tried to leave that horrible place twice, but I was completely out of the loop. I've accepted it as a necessary evil, and normally I don't even post there much, I don't know what came over me yesterday. You are responsible to yourself. Let them be responsible for their own lives. Public gay hating under the supposed authority of the bible is disrespectful. Spamming emotionally charged socially polarizing emails is disrespectful. These people getting assed up over your response to unsolicited hate email is absurd. Maybe whoever sent this mass email out will think twice about doing it again. This is an era of change. Churches need to get over the gay thing. It's a losing battle. If the churchies have any smarts at all they should take your FB rant as a warning that the upcoming generations are not going to put up with institutionalized hate. They are losing attendees with their hate messages. Oh well, it is one of the growing pains of our evolving society. :-) If I were you, I'd post the bolded text on my FB wall... or a paraphrased version of it in my own voice. It's the rational view from an observer who is outside the xian bubble. I agree with all the advice about telling them it's not up for discussion, or setting up filters for the worst offenders etc. You don't have to accept the crap that any of them say to you. You have an opportunity to stand up for what is important and real for you, and to help the silent onlookers who are also having doubts. You can show them that an unbeliever is a happy, calm, responsible person and not a freak. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted November 15, 2014 Share Posted November 15, 2014 Well I'm not worried about the "intervention" stuff that was focused on getting me to keep believing. However, I had been planning on talking to some people face to face or on the phone, and various random things kept screwing up that plan for the last couple weeks. I feel bad that I broke the "news" to them on Facebook. It was irresponsible and disrespectful of me. I actually hate Facebook with a burning passion, but among the people I know, if it didn't happen on Facebook, it didn't happen. I've tried to leave that horrible place twice, but I was completely out of the loop. I've accepted it as a necessary evil, and normally I don't even post there much, I don't know what came over me yesterday. You are responsible to yourself. Let them be responsible for their own lives. Public gay hating under the supposed authority of the bible is disrespectful. Spamming emotionally charged socially polarizing emails is disrespectful. These people getting assed up over your response to unsolicited hate email is absurd. Maybe whoever sent this mass email out will think twice about doing it again. This is an era of change. Churches need to get over the gay thing. It's a losing battle. If the churchies have any smarts at all they should take your FB rant as a warning that the upcoming generations are not going to put up with institutionalized hate. They are losing attendees with their hate messages. Oh well, it is one of the growing pains of our evolving society. :-) If I were you, I'd post the bolded text on my FB wall... or a paraphrased version of it in my own voice. It's the rational view from an observer who is outside the xian bubble. I agree with all the advice about telling them it's not up for discussion, or setting up filters for the worst offenders etc. You don't have to accept the crap that any of them say to you. You have an opportunity to stand up for what is important and real for you, and to help the silent onlookers who are also having doubts. You can show them that an unbeliever is a happy, calm, responsible person and not a freak. It can be fun to use 'love' against the Christians. What would Jesus do? Someone posted the 'separate but equal' philosophy regarding marriage for straight people vs 'civil unions' for gay people on FB a while back. I left a comment that Jesus loves us all, gay, straight or otherwise and cited John 3:16....no further comments on that thread. A Christian actually posted something recently about how we should all have our President's back whether or not we personally agree with his policies or not. We should not promote hate of our President. I posted a comment about forgiveness and a scriptural reference to it. :-) That thread died. Most of the people on my feed want to play nice , anyway, no matter their religious/political bent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ginko12 Posted November 16, 2014 Author Share Posted November 16, 2014 Heh, Mr. Nice Guy just said some not-so-nice things to me in a private message, and elsewhere took a nasty and completely gratuitous swipe at trans* people. This is really eye-opening, and not in a good way. On the other hand, I did have some phone conversations yesterday that were very respectful and went very well. Those were the people I thought were important enough to me to speak to them individually about this, so at least they seem to feel the same way about me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted November 16, 2014 Share Posted November 16, 2014 Heh, Mr. Nice Guy just said some not-so-nice things to me in a private message, and elsewhere took a nasty and completely gratuitous swipe at trans* people. This is really eye-opening, and not in a good way. I got into an email disagreement with an exchurchmate about the Christian opinion I was 'supposed' to have about something. I was no longer a bible thumper but I used bible scripture against him and it really pissed him off. :-) We don't communicate anymore. Oh well, he can enjoy being afraid of his imaginary friend and I'll enjoy my life in my own way. I like having my own personal opinions. Some people are wired to follow the pack... some aren't. One good thing out of all this is you are exerting your own individuality a bit. People have taken notice and are aware you are thinking for yourself. Some people will value your individuality. Others wont. Enjoy who you are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaseph Posted November 16, 2014 Share Posted November 16, 2014 Nice to meet you Ginko12! Wow I respect how you are willing to fight for your ideals. Looking back you may think it was a bit impulsive, but I think it was brave. Churches are filled with people who are moral and intellectual cowards who just follow their authority, even if it tells them to hate gays. About the whole fb thing; I hope you'll be fine. In my opinion going public as an ex-christian is not necessarily a bad choice, in fact I think it can be great. I did it a few weeks ago. Got a good amount of discussion and people wanting to talk with me, but very little negativity. Even if there was more negativity is was worth it to me - I don't feel part of christianity anymore and I know people won't think of me as a christian anymore, which is nice. So I hope everything works out fine for you. You could write one non-impulsive post with an extimony (containing only the parts that you feel are appropriate to share of course) so you could explain yourself clearly. I wrote my post in a way that wouldn't offend people - for example I explained that doubting is not a nice experience and that I am happy that I finally made a decision. I also mentioned that I am not interested in heated arguments. Some people did start some heated arguments via private messages, but I just posted back to them telling them very clearly that I did not have time for their nonsense. You can always PM me for advice. Once again I think what you did was very honorable! I'm sure you inspire other people! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StillLooking Posted November 17, 2014 Share Posted November 17, 2014 Ugh, I feel so ashamed of myself. I'm coming out of a very conservative form of Christianity (Orthodoxy). There used to be a lot of talk about how the culture war issues just don't plague this church; there's no arguments about women's roles, homosexuality, etc. I think that was only because for awhile the church was mostly filled with immigrants, because the more Americans convert, and the more the children and grandchildren of immigrants Americanize, the more these questions start to show up. There was an argument going on the past week or two about a parish being welcoming to gays and lesbians. My husband first told me about it. Then yesterday I got an email "my" parish priest wanted forwarded to everyone in the parish. It was a link to this incredibly judgmental, unkindly worded statement by a bunch of clergy about how terrible homosexuality is, and how intolerable it is to wonder if maybe there's nothing wrong with homosexuality. To me it read, "If you don't hate gay people, get out of this religion." I was incensed. I have always tried to keep out of the political fights in my church because they just piss me off. Hard to stay out of it when it shows up in everybody's inbox. I think, "Well, I already had one foot out the door, now they're pushing the rest of me out. So I guess this parting ways is mutual." I let my anger and frustration get the best of me and I posted something to that effect on Facebook. One guy from my old parish, who is nice and I like him a lot, responded. At one point he said something about how without Christ, he couldn't make himself better. That just touched me off even more, and I started saying how Christ was never there for me, in all the moments that I screamed out for him to help me, please! Nothing. So of course practically every Christian I know sees this and thinks I'm going down the tubes, and my life is horrible because God won't respond to me, and blah blah blah, even though I'm describing a way I felt 2-3 years ago. It's like an intervention on my FB page. And I'm trying to explain, look, I'm not in this much pain now, I'm actually happy now, and I'm not angry at God anymore, I just don't feel like there's anybody there. And by the way, everything else about my life is awesome now, here's a list. But everyone just keeps focusing on me feeling tortured by God giving me the silent treatment. And how about those friends and family I mentioned that helped me out? Didn't God put them in my path? Well, I suppose it's possible, but I see no compelling reason to believe that. Anyway, I woke up this morning embarrassed about the whole thing. This was not how I wanted to handle it and I let myself get irritated into doing something stupid. I know the feeling will pass and people who really care about me will forgive me. But in the meantime I have some fences to mend. Don't be ashamed of yourself. What you did there was very courageous. Only a few people are brave enough to do this, especially in a community full of minorities. Now, if you dig more about bible and christian doctrine discrepancies, you can have more reasons to give those christians for reasons why you left church. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leo Posted November 17, 2014 Share Posted November 17, 2014 I thgink yu shouldn't feel bad about coming out. I have been mildly outed because I posted a comment on a friend's post and said I am an atheist. The Facebook community at large has not seen this. But a few have, a few unsuspecting ones whom I didn't know would see it. Thanks to how things get shared between users. No fallout yet and hopefully none. But honestly, you can't blame yourself for what happened. You were provoked, I think that's pretty easy to see. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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